Veritas
by Lily Severn
Summary: Severus Snape has been called a traitor, a coward, a murderer. Now these titles are finally coming to fruition, but not truthfully. He has committed the ultimate betrayal, and knows that no one in the wizarding world will believe the truth. PreDH.


A/N: _I have tried my utmost to keep JKR's quotes out of this, and if you find that any of them have--completely inadvertently--made it into this fic, please alert me as soon as possible, so I can refrain from making accidental TOS violations. This does contain SPOILERS for HBP, so read at your own discretion. Reviews are greatly appreciated. Thank you._

**Veritas**

* * *

_As shadows call among the dim  
So I wait, I fall for him  
He speaks my name, obey I must  
Entwining in each breath his trust  
As shadows call among the dead  
Thus he rests his tired head  
And innocence, to my heart it cleaves  
A purity no one believes_

The Dark Mark above my head is glittering and green, slicing into the sky with a ferocity that I have not seen in years. The inky blackness behind it makes it shine like a jewel, a mockery of the pain and horror that it causes. I have not performed that particular spell in years; I can't say that it was a comfort to whisper _Morsmordre_ into the night air.

Below me, far below, I hear shrieks of terror, stone shattering, glass breaking, tapestries being rent into thick threaded pieces. I hang my head, praying silently for the salvation of what had once been a pristine castle devoid of Death Eater infiltration. My one place of comfort and solitude is falling apart around me, and I, Severus Snape, am watching the castle fall apart. But not from the right side this time. There was no way to extricate myself from the circumstance.

If I hadn't taken that damn Unbreakable Vow...if I hadn't felt myself softened, against my will, by Narcissa's pleading eyes, been stung by her sister's indignant scoffs, this would never have happened. I could let Draco commit his deed, wash myself clean of this incident...protect Dumbledore. I can do my duty as a spy, not as a Death Eater.

Yet, if I break this vow, if I tear and claw at the burning red flames that had coiled around my arm and Narcissa's, branding us, much as the Dark Mark, and entwining us for a common cause, I will die. Death at this stage in the upcoming war is not an option. The Order needs infiltration, and while Remus has undoubtedly been doing well, for a werewolf, in any case, my information is most valuable.

I tear open the thick wooden door and race down the steps, thinking hard, quickly. Cleverness can come into play only so far with this. Draco does not need protection to commit murder; but can I deter him long enough to give Dumbledore a chance to flee? He won't, I know, he's a stubborn old man, but I can live knowing that I had tried. Another failure to scar my soul with, another death to my name, but I won't be the one with the blood dripping from my hands.

It can go according to plan, I think desperately. It can be foolproof, if other Death Eaters don't see. If Draco hesitates, for one moment, if I cannot reach him first, they will goad him and frighten him into submission. His mind is just weak enough, just malleable enough, to mold into that of a killer. It won't take much. But knowing my Slytherin, as I have for the past six years, he will savor the moment and lord over his prey with hungry gray eyes. He will take his sweet time.

I think of Apparition, concentrate on the protective enchantment round the castle. The magic is ancient, entwined with the entire being of the castle. If I can attune myself to the---

There. A break in the field, growing stronger. Someone must be entering the castle...

Dumbledore. It must be Dumbledore. He needs to be warned, but if I am seen here, there will no doubt be suspicion. I slide into the shadows, Disapparate, and Apparate into my office. The door is closed, my things are as I have left them. I sit at my desk, tearing out a piece of parchment, scrawling quickly on its surface, the black ink smudging slightly in my haste.

_Dumbledore, _

Draco Malfoy has been sent to kill you. I will do all in my power to stop him. Please, keep yourself safe, do not let him confront you. Keep Harry away.

Prof. S 

I am about to sign when someone bursts in. I cannot look up, this deed is too important, I need him to receive it before the Death Eaters find me again. I hear a voice cry, shocked and frightened," They're here, Severus! The attack has begun!"

I stand and raise my wand, issuing a quick, nonverbal Stupefy before seeing fully who it is that has just warned me. I stare openmouthed as I notice that it's Filius Flitwick, lying in a white-bearded, silk-robed heap on my floor. He apparently hit his head on my desk on the way down.

I fold the parchment into my vest, brush by him, and nearly run into Hermione Granger, her erratic brown hair more awry, and her odd little friend, Luna Lovegood. " Professor!" they cry, their eyes pleading. " Death Eaters are attacking!"

I feign surprise and gesture them into my office." I will see to protecting the students. Take Professor Flitwick to the infirmary; he's fainted from shock." They nod and rush in, eager to help.

As I emerge into the fray outside, leaving the darkness of the dungeons behind, I rush up to Dumbledore's office, gasping out the password. The gargoyle leaps aside, and when I knock, no one responds. I curse, hanging my head and thinking. Dumbledore had assuredly let down the Apparition perimeter, but if he had done so, why would he not be in his office? I did not see him in the entrance hall...

He must be on the tower. I run back to the stairs, realizing that the perimeter has sealed itself once more and that I must make my way to him on foot. The lateness of my arrival may mean tragedy for all involved. The winding stairs seem endless, curving and twisting into darkness only briefly punctuated by flickering torches.

As I round the last corner, I spot Bellatrix, her ear pressed to the door, leading to the outside. She is listening fervently, hoping for the sound of Dumbledore's dying breath, no doubt. She turns, her glittering eyes faceting on me.

" Think you're going to defend Albus now, _Snape_?" she hisses, drawing closer. She grabs at the front of my robes with her talon-like hands, gripping and shaking me." I always knew you were a coward--"

My anger flares inside of me." I am nobility compared to you, you worthless wench!" I cry, throwing her off of me and watching her slam into the wall. Just when I think she's not about to rise, just as my hand reaches for the door, she lunges with a growl and tears at me, ripping me away. We roll onto the floor and she kneels over me imperiously, one hand pressing on my chest, the other holding her wand, the tip of which is thrust between my eyes.

I look at her evenly." Bellatrix, you won't do this. You won't kill me." My voice is silky enough to almost convince her, but the facade of determination does not drift far away before it is replaced by her usual malice.

Bellatrix grins wickedly, and I see a gleam in her eyes that makes my heart sink to the stone floor." Oh, no, Severus," she whispers, trailing a cold, thin finger along my jawline. I shiver." I will _make_ you kill."

I try to get to my feet, pushing against her, but her reflexes are quick and she responds with a hissed,"_Petrificus Totalus_!"

My body freezes rigidly, and my arms snap to my sides. I stare at her with utmost loathing, my sneer pasted to my pale face. She cackles and waves her wand, crying,"_Imperio_!"

Suddenly, I feel very detached. I know what it's like to be under this Curse, it's absolutely maddening. I can see her face, lit by a torch as though the Dark Lord himself had lit it, a demonic red gleam in her eyes. She waves her wand and whispers," Kill Dumbledore...make him pay..."

Inside, I'm screaming, fighting against her with all of my strength, mentally tearing at that smirking face. But I can't stop what she's making me do. I can't fight back. For once in my life, I am powerless before another Death Eater. Her whims become my own, and in a small corner of my mind, I am Bellatrix's intentions.

I open the door, and, seeing Draco Malfoy towering over a rather defenseless Dumbledore, my heart cries out for him. He is thin, weak, pale and shaking. His black traveling cloak is soaking wet, and his eyes are dim. He is sinking slowly down the tower wall, clutching at consciousness. My mind screams for my hand to withdraw the note, to say something, to prove that this isn't me about to commit such a betrayal, it's Bellatrix. But my body does otherwise.

I feel as a marionette must feel upon a string, jostled and moved independently from their mind's wishes. A voice next to me says something about a problem, but I'm not listening. I'm concentrating, desperately, hopefully, to fight against the Curse. It isn't working.

As I gaze into Dumbledore's face, memorizing every line, every lock of silver hair by his temple, where he used to withdraw his memories and share them with me, his blue eyes soften. They twinkle for a brief moment, and I know as long as I live that the image will remain in my mind. It is perfection, in that brilliant blue eye. It is grace, dignity, cleverness, potential...love for the outcasts. Love for a man whom he had once called his son, who is now about to, unwillingly, murder him.

He speaks so quietly, so pleadingly, that were I myself, I would have sobbed before him as a young school boy. That voice, so timid, breaking with desperation, cuts through me like a knife. I will hear the one word echo in my ears for eternity, condemning me to a hell not entirely self-made. He whispers my name.

I push Draco aside, glaring at him contemptuously, a face I know I have perfected, but am not willingly doing. The three Death Eaters nearest to Draco move as well, gleefully awaiting the inevitable murder of the Hogwarts Headmaster.

The twinkle quickly melts into paralyzed fear as he sees the fury that must be fixed upon my face. I feel the hated features contorting, my hooked nose wrinkling, my lips curving into a snarl, and my eyes narrowing, brows furrowing, skin tightening. _No, Albus, see who it really is, read my mind, Albus!_

He begs for his life, I would gladly have obliged, to have held his feeble wrist and pulled him up, administering an antidote for whatever poison he has clearly suffered under. But I don't. I raise my wand, and inwardly, shudder. _This can't be happening..._

I sneer the Killing Curse, and watch, helplessly, sobbing inside, as the emerald light pierces his chest, sends him flying over the tower's edge, and down below.

Had I control over myself, I would have fallen to my knees, desperately clinging to every shred of his voice, his memory. I had not the opportunity, as I snarled something to the Death Eaters and dragged Draco down the steps with me. We wind down the stairs, and I see he is trembling violently. I am not, but my nerves now belong to Bellatrix.

The hallway is filled with smoke and ash, chunks of stone and glass littering the floor. Students are being followed by Death Eaters, but I am intent on leaving. I wind around corners, through halls, my feet carrying me to where Bellatrix, wherever she is, has commanded my body to take me. Draco follows obediently, and I hear footsteps, far away, trailing us.

When I emerge into the dark night, I'm running faster than I have ever run in my life, my lungs searing. I see a red flash over my head, a Stupefying jinx, and turn. I yell something to Draco and he sprints off.

I soon realize that I am face to face with Harry Potter. _No, he's innocent, these aren't my orders..._ We duel for a short time, I am blocking his hexes effectively, shouting things to Death Eaters that I can't hear, they sound muffled and distant, as though someone else is speaking them underwater. I can only imagine what cruel insults I'm shouting to Potter, how much I have revealed to him. Does he know yet that I am the Half-Blood Prince? The boy's a bit too dense for that, I'll have to explain; he can't earn Potions glory on his own.

Slowly, I feel her hold on me lessening, the effects of the Imperius Curse wearing off. She is withdrawing her power. I come back into my own mind, exhausted, just as I hear Harry seethe the word "coward".

My instability at the sight of Dumbledore's death, by my hand, my horror at my misdeed, the entire inexplicable unfairness of it all, crashes around me. The hatred, the unwanted, undeserved, hatred, in Potter's eyes makes me snap before I can profess my condition to him. I scream at him, feeling my fury as though it was an ethereal emotion, not entirely mine. I have been called a coward too many times, endured that name for far too long. And I can feel the heat rising in my face, I can almost feel the madness within me. This is too much, too many instances gone wrong, too many perfect plans to aid my Headmaster and professors tampered with, destroyed...

Before I can help it, I lash out at him, using a complex Whipping Charm that I'd perfected long ago. A shadow descends upon me and I feel talons rip into my arms and chest, and I stagger back. The hippogriff beast follows me, calling after me in such demonic fury that I throw myself at the gates, wrenching them open and falling back into the grass.

In my anguish, as I Disapparate, my mind goes black.

--

When I wake, I am in the Forbidden Forest, outside of Hogwarts grounds. I feel the ache and sharp pain of the hippogriff's marks in my arms and torso as I struggle to sit up. The bark of a tree bites into my back. I look around.

I am alone.

I shudder, looking up into the sky. It is the next morning, still early, gray and diamond, sparkled with stars. It would be beautiful, had I not woken in such a state.

I look down at my robes. They are torn, covered in blood, which means I am still alive, this isn't some horrible dream that I will wake from. I will not open my eyes, to see the comforting emerald green of my canopy above my bed, rise to another warm cup of tea from Albus.

Albus. I hold my head in my hands, sobbing loudly. My cries must surely be enough to wake the dead; how I vehemently, with a burning in my heart, wish they could. I am forever branded as his murderer, betraying him, the one man I had befriended closer than all others. He thought, in his dying moments, that I was a traitor. That I was no better than Pettigrew.

This news is a blow. I feel hot tears coursing down my face, for the injustice of it all, the cruelty, the anguish being solely focused on the wizard's desperate eyes, his murmured pleas. He had spoken my name, at the last. He had begged _me_ for mercy.

They will be burying him soon, I know. I cannot show my face at his funeral, I will be murdered. I cannot even pay my respects to a man who was more of a father to me than my Muggle one. He had been the world to me in a time of crisis, and I cannot even repay him by saying a eulogy over his grave. It is a sin, that I have made them all realize that Hogwarts without Dumbledore is hardly Hogwarts at all.

This should have not happened now.

Harry should have spent his seventh year waiting for exams and looking forward to becoming an Auror, a highly doubtful and hard to realize goal, but attainable nonetheless. The students should be leaving with me as their Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, the best, assuredly. But I will never return.

This realization, compounded with Dumbledore's death, tears my soul in two. My one dream, my aspiration, to be seen as more sensitive than callous, more good than evil, to be finally recognized as a member of the light, of the Order, is shattered. The visage the wizarding world has come to tolerate is now one it will hate with even more furor. I am a dead man, broken by a simple Curse I should have been able to avoid. No one will believe that this was the truth. No one will listen to my cries in Azkaban. My anguish is my own to live with.

I would rather have died than murdered for Dumbledore, I would rather have broken the Vow and met whatever doom was to be mine than to feel this guilt, to see the broken hearted faces of the world. I could piece them back together, if they only believed me. If they would rather listen to me than kill me the moment I breathe my name, the moment I open my eyes.

They will hate me, as they always have. They will spit my name as a curse, destroy my accomplishments, revoke my Order of Merlin, desecrate my family name, dishonor me, defile me, make me out to be a betraying Death Eater. They will never believe me. The world will never know the truth, because I will be dead before the words leave my lips.

_Oh, Albus. Please forgive me. Know in your last moments that it was not I that murdered you. It was not my will, not my duty._

Desperation takes hold as I close my eyes. The situation is grave, but the peril ahead is much worse. If I cannot proclaim the truth...Azkaban will have one more innocent man in chains.

* * *

Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, settings, plots, themes, quotes, events, ideas, props, and other assorted items are property of J.K. Rowling. There is no money being made from the reading, writing, posting, correcting, listing, printing, or any other actions in connection with fan fiction of this fic. Any original characters not previously seen in any of J.K. Rowling's books, the movies related to the books, or in any other related medium are my property. If it any time there is another character utilizing the same name, spelling, etc., there is no connection unless verified by the author. Any attempt to use my characters must result in the author questioning me for permission before writing their fic, art, or other medium. I've tried my best to not use the dialogue from _Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince_, but if any manages to make its way in, it's JK Rowling's property, not mine.


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